Living in Reverse
by thebonron
Summary: AU. Dan is living with Karen and Lucas while Deb is a single mom raising Nathan alone. So when Nathan joins the basketball team and starts becoming "friends" with Lucas's girlfriend, what will Dan and Lucas do to stop him from playing.
1. Reversed

Deb came into the room of her sixteen year old son, Nathan. "Wake up, honey," she said. "It's time to go to school."

"Mo-om," Nathan whined. "Five more minutes."

"No, not five more minutes. You already hit the snooze button four times. I want you to be downstairs, eating breakfast in ten minutes. If you're not, I'll drag you right out of bed and into school the way you are now." 

"Aw Mom," Nathan laughed. "Fine, I'm up." Nathan got out of bed and started getting dressed.

"Good," Deb smiled. "I'll meet you downstairs. I scrambled some eggs for you. You should eat them before they get cold."

"Alright, Mom, thanks," Nathan smiled. "I'll be right down."

Twenty minutes later, Nathan and Deb were out the door, driving towards the school. Every morning, Deb would drop Nathan off on her way to work. After school was over Nathan would walk towards home or to the little restaurant that his mother owned—Deb's Diner—to help his mother out with the customers. Anyways, this time around, Nathan and Deb were already a bit later as they were getting out the door, so by the time Nathan had signed in at the office, dropped his stuff off at his locker and walked into class it was nine o'clock, twenty minutes after school had started. The English teacher, Mr. Roberge, looked at him as he was coming into the door.

"Ah, Mr. Scott, nice of you to decide to join us. Please take your seat and take out the novel we've been studying."

"Yes, sir," Nathan said, not wanting to attract anymore attention to himself. Even though English was one of his favourite subjects, he dreaded going to this class with a passion. The class boring, pointless and the opposite of how English should be taught (every day they'd read a chapter of a book for homework and then write a summary of it in their journal, to be tested on their understanding of the plot once every two weeks). But that Nathan could take. What he couldn't take was the constant bullying from the arrogant asshole Lucas and his friends.

"Well, well, would you look who it is?" Lucas whispered to Nathan, quiet enough for the whole class to hear, but not loud enough for Mr. Crompton, who was sitting at the other side of the class in his desk to notice and do something about it. "The bastard baby. You know, it would have done us all a favour if you would have just stayed home. Or switched schools for that matter."

Nathan was tempted to say something back to the jerk, but decided against it. It would only result in a fight and Nathan had already been suspended twice for fighting. He was smart and got good grades, so it killed his mother when he got in trouble for something so stupid. After seeing the look on her face when he told her that he had gotten suspended again, Nathan made a mental note to himself to try to behave better and not react to Lucas's taunts. It was harder than it seemed, though...

Lucas Scott was Nathan's half brother. They had the same father—the infamous Dan Scott. Dan had been dating a girl from his high school, Karen Roe, ever since the tenth grade. He had gotten her pregnant the summer after graduation and the two of them decided to get married and raise the baby. However, Dan got a basketball scholarship to the University of North Carolina at the very last minute and decided to go and try to balance school, basketball and being a father all at the same time.

Eighteen years old is such a young age to settle down, though, and once at school Dan met someone else. He started seeing Nathan's mom, Deb Lee, behind Karen's back. But it was never meant to be between Dan and Deb and shortly after Deb told Dan that she was pregnant, Deb left her and went back to Karen. Karen was mad at him, of course, but for the sake of the unborn baby decided to forgive him. So that's how it ended up that Dan, Karen and baby Lucas went on to live the nice, good life in the house that Dan's parents had helped them buy while Deb was left alone with a newborn son. Still, she had managed to pull through and open up her own diner, making enough money to give her and Nathan a pretty good life. Dan was as uninvolved in Nathan's life as physically possible in a town as small as Tree Hill. But no matter how bad either Dan or Deb tried to forget about what had happened and move on with their lives, word started going around. Due to some mix-up at the hospital, Nathan's last name had been written down as Scott instead of Lee. The fact that Dan Scott was living a happy life with his family while his other, unwanted son was living in the same town became the topic of over-the-phone gossip for many people. Everywhere any of the people involved went, other people would stare and whisper things behind their backs.

Still, this bothered the adults a lot more than it bothered the kids. Growing up, Nathan was dimly aware that a kid in his grade named Lucas Scott was his half brother, but since the two of them were never friends and neither parent talked about the other boy to their son other than the watered down version of what happened back then, the boys didn't pay much attention to each other or the gossip that was, like all initially juicy stories, starting to die down on its own anyways.

It was when the boys entered high school that the trouble began. Nathan, who had always enjoyed playing basketball down by the river court with his friends, decided to try out for the team. He didn't make it in his first or second year of high school, since he was competing against guys a lot older than him. In fact, the only freshman on the school team was Lucas Scott, but that wasn't surprising. His daddy had probably had a word with the school or something. After all, Dan Scott lived, breathed and slept for basketball and if his son wasn't on the team by the time he entered ninth grade he very well could have died.

Nathan tried out for the team one more time in the eleventh grade. Whitey, who had noticed the talent the boy possessed early on, but didn't let him join the team from the beginning because of the other, more valuable players the school had at that time, finally gave Nathan a spot on the team, along with a jersey and his own locker in the school changing room. Nathan was overjoyed, but some other people weren't. Some other people were very ticked off by Whitey's decision. And those people went by the names of Dan and Lucas Scott.

Dan, who had spent the better part of the first sixteen years of Lucas' life making a top basketball star out of him, couldn't stand the embarrassment of his other son, Nathan, making the team without any of his coaching. He saw it as a fluke on Whitey's part, a joke that had gone too far. But when a few months passed and Nathan continued playing on the team, Dan decided that this needed to be stopped. He drilled it into Lucas's head that Nathan was an enemy, someone that needed to be gotten rid of as soon as possible. Since then, Lucas made it his personal mission to make Nathan's life as difficult as possible. Being one of the most popular guys in the whole school gave him a group of supporters to do it with. Suddenly Nathan became the subject of constant bullying and harassment. Pushing him into lockers, stealing his clothes after practice, provoking him in order to start a fight, what they did was nothing original. Still, it was really starting to piss Nathan off.

All that was going on wasn't something that Nathan wanted or liked to talk about, since it was embarrassing for a sixteen year-old junior to complain about bullying. Nevertheless, it was really starting to get the better of him. He was tired of always putting up with it. Sometimes, he was even tempted to put a stop to it by giving Dan and Lucas what they wanted and quitting the team. But no, basketball was something that he loved to do and Dan and Lucas weren't going to stand in the way of that. Still, something needed to be done about this problem. Nathan just didn't know what yet…

Anyways, the rest of the day went by pretty smoothly. Lucas and his buddies were busy with a party they were planning at Tim's house that weekend, so the only things they did that day was make some comments about Nathan being a "bastard". Pretty mild, considering past events. After school was over, Nathan walked home. He would have walked to the restaurant, but he had a lot of homework that day. Deb would understand—she never pressured Nathan to help her out, he volunteered on his own.

Nathan walked the half-mile towards his house and went up to his room. He was just about to get started on his math homework when he heard a weird sound outside his bedroom window. He looked out and noticed Lucas and a group of his friends standing outside his house throwing eggs at it. Nathan felt the anger rising up in him and went outside to settle things.


	2. Fight

"What are you doing?" Nathan asked, coming out of the house.

"What does it look like we're doing, loser?" Tim called. "We're egging your house."

"Yeah, I guess I phrased that question wrong. What I really wanted to know was _why _you're doing it and who the hell you think you are."

"We're doing it 'cause it seems like the only way to send the message through to you: we don't want you on the team," Lucas replied, while reaching for a fresh carton of eggs.

"Well you can do what you want, it's still not going to make me quit the team. And if you continue throwing things at my house, you will be standing face to face to some cops very soon."

That was obviously the wrong thing to say, since it only made Lucas and his gang angrier. It was never good to mention cops.

"Oh yeah? Well then how about we settle things before the cops get here, you bastard son?"

Nathan wasn't usually the first one to start a fight, but when someone started talking about his sore spot, his dad leaving him, he wasn't one to control his temper. He stepped up to Lucas.

"What did you just say?"

"You heard me, bastard son."

Somewhere deep inside his consciousness, Nathan realized that starting a fight against someone who had a group of ten people behind him wasn't the smartest idea in the world. His rage got the better of him, however, and he came up to Lucas and punched him in the face.

It took Lucas a total of about twenty seconds to gather himself before throwing the second punch. After that, the little scuffle soon escalated into a full-blown fight as Lucas' friends stepped in to stick up for him. Things were not looking good.

In fact, things would have probably ended badly if not for the siren that could be heard somewhere in the distance. Street fights had been an ongoing issue in Tree Hill, one that the police had been battling with since the 1980s. All of the Tree Hill students had been told time and time again, through principal announcements, police visits and guest speakers, that serious consequences would ensue for anyone caught fighting in the street.

"Dude, let's get out of here," one of Luke's friends said. "He's not worth it."

"Yeah, let's…" Luke said, breaking away from the fight. "But don't for one second think this is over." He gestured towards Nathan.

"I didn't," Nathan said, to no one in particular as he watched the cars that the guys had jumped into rush out into the street. The siren, meanwhile, was getting louder and in a few seconds Nathan could see that it wasn't a police car after all, it was an ambulance driving to the nearby hospital a couple of blocks away.

Well, he had been lucky this time. Not only had the fight dissipated before they could attract attention, it hadn't lasted long enough for him to get a black eye or anything like that. If there was one thing that Nathan didn't want to do that night, it was to explain things to his mother. She was the one person that he couldn't lie to, so if she asked, he would have to tell her the truth. But if she never asked…

Nathan started walking back towards his house to get some cleaning supplies in order to clean up the mess that Lucas and his friends had left behind. After all, in order for his mother to not notice anything different about the house, there had to be nothing different about the house… Nathan opened the front door and headed into the kitchen, to reach for the paper towels and the cleaning solution. Hopefully tomorrow Lucas and his friends would forget about this fight and leave it alone. Deep down though, Nathan knew that that wasn't going to happen. Tomorrow was going to be a long day.


	3. Project Partners

The next morning Nathan was early coming to school. Lucas, on the other hand was late, coming into class just as Mr. Crompton was starting to explain the lesson plan for the day. That meant that the boys had no time to exchange quips or insults before class.

"Hello, class," Mr. Crompton said just as Lucas was coming in. "I've been receiving some complaints about all of the reading you had to do, so I thought we'd change gears a bit. We just finished reading _1984_, so I think it'd be appropriate to do a project on it. But since it's almost Spring Break there's not enough time for you each to do a project individually. That is why I am going to let you work in pairs…"

The class murmured something appreciatively.

"…that I will assign."

_Great_, Nathan thought. _Knowing my luck, I'll be stuck working with Pucas_.

But he wasn't. His partner was Haley James, Lucas' girlfriend. This was better than working with Lucas himself, but only by a little bit. Haley James was the kind of person parents were always comparing you to: very pretty, very smart and nice to practically everyone. Nathan could easily see "flirting with his girlfriend" being added to the already long list of reasons for Lucas to hate his guts.

"I will give you some class time to start planning your report now, but I advise you: the majority of the work is to be done at home," Mr. Crompton said after assigning the last partner. "So you better make good use of the time I give you…"

Nathan smiled awkwardly at Haley who pulled up a chair next to his desk.

"Hey," she said. "So I guess we should get started on this thing, huh?"

"Yeah," Nathan said. "What are your ideas?"

"Well, I think we should do a Power Point… Teachers are always impressed if it's high tech…"

"I guess… I could start on it tonight and email it to you."

"I think we should do it together, at least for the first part. We wouldn't want to have to redo it later because our parts don't match. How about you come over to my house after school today?"

"Um, I don't think that's such a good idea…"

"Why not? Do you have somewhere you have to be? I can't tomorrow, but maybe Thursday…"

"Um, no, that's no what I meant," Nathan wondered if Haley was playing dumb or if she really didn't know. "I meant that, you know, I don't think Lucas would like it if he saw me coming over to your house."

"Oh, right. You and him have that grudge thing going on. About your dad or something like that. Well, we're just doing homework. Besides, it's not like he can tell me who I can and cannot see. Besides, it's not like we have to announce this to him. He has his own project to work on."

"I like the way you think," Nathan said. Haley giggled and Nathan had to smile back. She looked pretty when she laughed.

"So I'll see you tonight?" Haley asked.

"Yeah, I guess you will," Nathan smiled. "Where do you live again?"

As they were sitting there talking, Lucas was sitting at the other side of the classroom, looking at them, shooting angry looks that neither of the two were noticing.

"Uh, Luke?" his partner Steve said. "I said that I'll pretty much do the whole project as long as you put together a summary of the book…"

"Huh? Oh yeah, sure… That guy has nerve. First he steals my spot in the line-up, then he throws a punch at me and now he's flirting with _my _girlfriend!" 

"What? No, I said that I'll do the project if you…"

"Whatever! That guy is going to pay! Tonight!


	4. Deep

After the final bell signalling the end of classes had rung, Nathan walked up to the front of the school with his backpack, in order to meet Haley. He had already called his mom earlier, telling her that he would be late coming home that day. He was his mom's only child, after all. She had a tendency to want to know his whereabouts at all times.

Haley walked up to him, with her backpack slung over one shoulder.

"Hey," she said. "Ready to go?"

"Yeah," Nathan replied. "Are we taking the bus or…"

"Yeah, this one over here. It's a five minute ride. I don't have a car or my licence, so Lucas usually gives me a ride home…"

"Yeah, me neither," Nathan said, to fill up the awkward space that had arisen after Haley mentioned Lucas's name. "I mean, I have my licence, just not my own car…"

"Well, just as well," Haley smiled. "Not everyone has a daddy that owns a car dealership. I mean, sometimes it seems like all Lucas can talk about is his Mustang."

Nathan didn't say anything. After all, he did, technically, have a daddy that owned a car dealership. That daddy just refused to pay any kind of child support to his mom all while buying his other, _chosen _son expensive cars.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Haley realized that another awkward gap had arisen. "That was so inconsiderate. I just keep forgetting that you two are brothers, you know. You look nothing alike and it's not like you talk…"

Nathan waved her apology away. "Don't worry about it. I don't really consider him my brother either."

Haley smiled. Talking about cars and brothers, they had reached her house.

"Okay, this is where I live," Haley said, opening the front door with her key. "My parents aren't home yet, so we can use the computer that's in the den. It's faster."

"Yeah, sure," Nathan said, with just a hint of disappointment in his voice. He had wanted to see Haley's room.

"So how do you think this PowerPoint should look like?"

They sat down at the computer and got to work. It was after they had gotten in a solid hour of work done that Haley's mom came in.

"Hey, Haley," she said. "I see you brought a friend…" 

"Yeah, this is Nathan, a friend from school," Nathan smiled and shook Haley's mom's hand. "We're working on a project together."

"Nathan Scott, by any chance? Lucas Scott's brother?"

"Um, yeah," Nathan replied, not wanting to get into it deeper than that.

"Uh, mom, we should really get started on the project…" It was just like Haley to save the day.

"Well unfortunately I need the computer now. So why don't the two of you go use the one in your room?"

"Okay," Haley said, saving their work and emailing it to herself. "Come on, Nate."

Haley's room, Nathan soon discovered, was like a museum. It wasn't particularly messy, it was just filled to the brim with things. There wasn't a space of wall that wasn't covered with a poster, a collage, a photo frame or a painting. There were two bookshelves, where every shelf was filled with not only books, but little knick-knacks like stuffed animals, miniature figurines and small plastic toys. The desk had its own compartments for everything: CDs, pens, paper, memo notes….

"Your room's… cozy," Nathan said.

"I guess it is cozy, isn't it," Haley laughed. "I know I should just get rid of most of this stuff, but I can't bear to throw any of it away. I save everything from old notes to report cards to candy wrappers... You know?"

"Well, not really, but I think it's great that you do. You never know what will become useful one day…"

"I know, right?" It was then that Haley suddenly changed gears. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Yeah, sure, anything…"

"I don't want to pry or anything like that, but… How did it happen that you and Lucas have the same dad, but don't talk to each other outside of school? I mean, shouldn't you see each other on weekends or something like that?"

"Um, no, we don't. Lucas lives with his parents and I live with my mom. The only reason I have the same last name is because Dan signed the birth certificate when I was born, then bolted out of that hospital. Since then, he never did anything to acknowledge me as his son."

"That's terrible! But you're born in the same year, how does that work."

"Lucas is three months older. Dan had an affair with my mom, but when he found out that she was pregnant he left her and came back to his _real _family."

"But that doesn't explain why Lucas hates you so much…" 

"Well, it kind of started when I joined the basketball team. He and Dan don't want me on it because it's embarrassing for them. I'm sure you can ask him yourself, though. He _is _your boyfriend," Nathan said, with a little bit of resentment.

"No, I don't really talk about those kinds of things with him. It'd feel awkward even trying"

"What kind of things?"

"His family and his feelings and stuff… We don't do a lot of talking."

"You've been dating him for almost a year! So what do you do together?"

"Um, go to parties and stuff… And, you know…"

"Yeah," Nathan added quickly. "I know."

"But you're different," Haley added, shifting away from the subject of what she had been doing with Lucas for one whole year. "I mean, I don't really know you all that well, but I feel like I can talk to you."

"That's good," Nathan said. "Because I feel like I can talk to you too."

"You're not like Lucas… you care about things other than popularity and high school… You care about people."

"Haley," Nate said, putting a hand on her arm. "If you're so unhappy with your relationship, why don't you just leave?"

Haley stared at him for a few seconds, unbelieving. "I can't… You don't understand. Who I am at school is deeply rooted around who Lucas is. I can't just… break away from all of that."

"What are you talking about? Of course you can. You're smart and deep and… beautiful."

Neither Haley nor Nathan could properly explain what happened next, but in a few minutes, they were in each other's arms, kissing. Kissing as if there was and never had been any boyfriend, any history, any popularity rift. Kissing as if they were meant for each other.

But storybook moment never last very long and a minute later Haley was pulling away.

"I'm sorry… I can't…" 

"But…"

"I like you, but… it's wrong..."

"Okay. I guess I should go," Nathan tried desperately not to ruin the moment, even though it had already been ruined. "Um, the project…"

"I'll email you the PowerPoint. We'll talk tomorrow at school." 

"Okay. Bye, Haley. You have a nice house."

Nathan showed himself out. He went downstairs, said goodbye to Haley's mom who was by now done using the computer and working on something in the kitchen and headed towards the door. It was as he was heading towards the gate that let him out of Haley's house that he noticed a very familiar Mustang parked nearby. _Huh. It looks a lot like Lucas's… Then again, there could be other Mustangs here…_ With that in mind, Nathan headed home, not giving the car and its owner any more of his attention.

What he didn't know was that at that very moment, his half-brother Lucas Scott was sitting in the car, angrily watching him. He had come over to check on Haley a few minutes earlier and was just about to go in when he noticed Nathan going out. Now there would really be hell to pay.


	5. Fight 2

The rest of the day was uneventful. Nathan spent the evening thinking about things. What was that with Haley? Was it nothing? Just them getting caught up in a moment? No, Nathan didn't believe that was it. He really liked Haley, but was it mutual? If it was, then they were in a bad spot since Haley was already taken. If it wasn't, then she was just fooling around, not really looking for anything serious with him. Things were bad no matter how you looked at them. Well, Nathan decided to just forget about it for one night and wait to see what would happen at school tomorrow. I mean, she wouldn't just ignore him, would she? They had a project to do.

When Nathan got to their English class that morning, Haley was already in her seat. Unfortunately, so was Lucas. Nathan took his seat quietly, waiting for class to start.

"Following some complaints about the amount of work I'm piling on you," said Mr. Crompton upon coming into the classroom after the bell. "I decided to also give you part of today's class to work on the project. However, I am not giving you this time to goof off and talk to your friends. If the noise level in this room gets to be too loud, I'll go back to my original lesson plan for the day. So it up to you whether you work on this here or at home. Understood?"

Nathan took this opportunity to come up to Haley, "Hey. So I guess we should go back to what we were doing last night… on the project."

"Nathan, this isn't a good idea," Haley whispered fiercely.

"Hales, it's not a big deal. No one was there. For all they know, all we did was work on the project."

"No, Nathan, Lucas does know. I don't know how but he saw something and he's mad. He left me a very angry voicemail last night."

"Are you serious?" 

"Yeah… He hasn't talked to me at all today, so I have no idea what he's thinking.'

"Great… Well, do you know how much he saw?"

"No… so we don't tell him anything unless he asks. God, Nathan, this is bad."

"Relax, Haley, it's not like he's going to confront us here. He doesn't exactly talk to me at school."

"Uh, Nate…" Haley said pointing behind him. Nathan turned around and saw Lucas angrily making their way towards them.

"So, you didn't get enough of last night?" Lucas asked. "You have to flirt with each other in front of everybody?"

"Luke, we're not flirting. We're project partners, remember?" Haley replied.

"Oh yeah? Well why were you at her house last night?" Luke said, diverting his attention to Nathan. ""The library not good enough for you?"

"Lucas! You can't tell me who I can see and where I can see them."

"Haley you're my girlfriend and I won't have you running around with people like him. You're acting like some kind of tramp."

"Hey—" Haley began but Nathan interrupted.

"Don't talk to her like that."

"Excuse me? I don't recall this being your business, so why don't you just stay out of it!" Lucas glared at his half-brother.

"Oh yeah? Well when you start accusing of her being trash because she hangs out with me it becomes my business, asshole."

"What did you just call me, jerk?"

"You heard me, loser."

"Moron."

"Little f-"

"Excuse me!" They suddenly heard the voice of Mr. Crompton pop up loud and clear behind them. "Apparently I didn't make myself clear the first time. I did not give you guys this time to goof off."

"Yeah, well we didn't really realize that we were—" Nathan attempted to explain. 

"Screaming at the top of your lungs? Well, I certainly did. That is why the time I originally gave you to work on your projects is now over. Everybody go back to your desk and take out a sheet of paper. I will begin my lesson on poetry."

The class grumbled something in response, angrily making their way back to their desks. Obviously no one was very happy with either of the Scott brothers at the moment.

"Alright, class," Mr. Crompton began. "Since you can't seem to be able to work independently, we'll do this as a class. Can anybody tell me what an epic is?"

When no one raised their hand, Mr. Crompton called on Lucas. "Mr. Scott. Since you seem to have so much to say about everything, see if you can answer this: what is an epic?"

"Yeah, Lucas," Nathan said mockingly. "See if you can answer this."

"Mr. Nathan. If I needed help managing my class I would ask for it. Lucas, I'm waiting."

"An epic is where I kick Nathan's ass," Lucas said without batting an eye. "Maybe that'll shut him up."

As soon as he said it, Nathan stood up from his desk and punched Lucas in the face. Next thing you knew, the two were at it again, fighting each other in their English classroom. The class found this fascinated, forming a circle around the two and cheering them on. However, Mr. Crompton found this less than amusing and broke up the fight. Fifteen minutes later both boys were sitting in the principal's office while the secretary called their parents.


	6. Plans

"Alright," Deborah said, walking into her house and sitting down at the kitchen table. "You want to explain to me why I had to leave work to come pick you up from school for fighting?"

"I fought," Nathan replied. 

"Yes, Nathan, from what the principal told me, I understand that you fought. I even understand that you fought with _Lucas_. What I don't understand is _why_."

"He started it," Nathan said, just like a five year-old would.

"Nathan even if that was true, that'd be a lousy defence for being involved in a fight. But it isn't true. Your principal told me that you threw the first punch."

"Well he started it when he accused me of seeing Haley and called me trash."

"I should have known a girl was involved. Who's Haley?"

"Just a girl. Lucas's girlfriend. It doesn't matter, Mom, what matters is that he's always giving me a hard time about everything."

"Nathan," Deb sighed. "He's not a good kid. That's understandable, since he wasn't exactly raised by the best people. But you, you're better than that. You never used to get in trouble before…"

"Well, he's been on my case lately…" Nathan began his already lame argument. "With basketball and Haley and such."

"Honey, I know," Deb said, changing her tone of voice slightly, from one of anger and outrage to one of concern. "It's partly my fault that things are this bad between the two of you. I mean, I'm sure that Dan had something to do with the way Lucas has been treating you. But that is not an excuse for you to stoop down to his level. I barely recognized you today."

"What do you mean?" Nathan asked.

"I mean that you're better than that, Nathan. I know that for a fact because I raised you better than that."

"You're right," Nathan sighed, beginning to feel a little bit of remorse for the first time that day. "I'm sorry, Mom. This kind of thing won't happen again. I'll… control my temper next time."

"Good," Deb got up and gave her son a hug. "That's what I like to hear."

"Thanks, Mom," Nathan said, getting up to go.

"Don't thank me yet. The school let you off with a warning, but I won't be that generous. I'm grounding you for the rest of the week. That means three days of nothing outside of school or practice."

"Fine," Nathan grumbled. "I guess I deserve it."

Deb smiled, amazed that this wasn't met with a fight, like it had been in previous instances. Nathan really was growing up.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, Dan was talking to Lucas.

"What's this I hear about a fight?" he asked, coming up to Lucas while he was lifting weights.

"Nothing, Dad," Lucas said, trying to get away from the topic as quickly as possible.

"Well, it wasn't nothing if the principal called your mother at work to come pick you up. Why were you fighting with Nathan?"

"He started hitting on my girlfriend in class. Dad, do we need to talk about this now?" 

"No, Lucas, we do need to talk about this now. Because do you not realize how quickly a stain on your records could ruin your chances of getting a scholarship to UNC?"

"Dad, I know, but he-"

"I don't care what he did!" Dan cut him off. "This is about you… If at least you were fighting about something related to basketball… But your girlfriend? Luke, don't you understand that you need to have your priorities straight?"

"Dad, I do, but he threw the first punch! What was I supposed to do, just stand there and do nothing?"

"Lucas, the kid has no right to be on the team in the first place. No one knows that better than me. However, you're still supposed to stay away from trouble while the college scouts are looking for you. How can you not understand that?"

"Dad—" Lucas started.

"Save it, Luke. Just don't let it happen again."

"I won't, but—"

"Find another way to get him off the team…"


	7. There's Always a But

The next few days were fairly uneventful. Dan's words must have had some kind of effect on Lucas since he stopped picking fights with Nathan… at least for the time being. Of course Nathan had no way of knowing that, so he was just happy to be getting a break from the constant fighting and getting into trouble. Without any other provocations at school, Nathan served the time he was supposed to be grounded like a model prisoner. He used it to finish the project he and Haley were working on… online. Nathan had the feeling that Haley was almost glad to have him being grounded as an excuse for them not to meet up anymore, but he just left it at that. Trying to figure things out would only cause unneeded awkwardness…

Deep down Nathan knew that they wouldn't be able to keep things this way forever. They had taken the easy way out by avoiding each other after the kiss. But after Nathan spent the whole weekend thinking about Haley, he decided that he needed closure. He wanted to talk to her, to see what she thought about the whole thing, whether she was angry with him for starting the fight… but more than all of that, he wanted to know whether or not the kiss between them meant as much to her as it did to him. Despite himself, he was starting to develop a serious crush on that girl… which wasn't good. Them getting together was improbable to begin with, but even if it were to happen, Lucas's wrath at the end of it all would be of the kind they write about in books. Still, Nathan felt like he had no other choice but to talk to Haley, as though _not _talking to her would make him go crazy.

That was why the following Monday, the first official day of his being ungrounded, Nathan came to school extra early and slipped a note in Haley's locker, asking her to meet him after school in the library. Again, a risky move, but Nathan felt like he had no other choice. He _had _to talk to her.

Going through his classes was torture. The only thing Nathan was thankful for was that he didn't have any together with Haley. _That _would have been bad. When the final bell signalling the end of school rang, Nathan ran out of his class as fast as he could and headed towards the library. Sitting there at a table, Nathan began to feel stupid. _What was he thinking asking Haley to come meet him at the library?_ _Even if she wanted to come, she probably wouldn't risk being seen with him by one of Lucas's buddies. And that was _if _she wanted to come… _

Nathan's thoughts were interrupted by someone coming up to him. He looked up and saw Haley, pulling up a chair next to him.

"Hi Nate," she said. "I got your note."

"Um, yeah," Nathan stammered, suddenly forgetting what he wanted to say. "I, uh, wanted to talk to you."

"Yeah, I know. Although the note surprised me, I was kind of glad you planted it there. I kind of wanted to talk to you too."

"Really? That's good. Although if I'd have thought it through better, I would have picked someplace better than the library, which is still in the school…"

"Are you kidding? It's genius!" Haley stifled a laugh. "Do you really think Lucas or one of his friends would be caught dead in a library?"

At that, Nathan laughed out loud. He had forgotten how easy talking to Haley really was.

"Anyways, Nate, I probably know what this is about," her voice broke him out of his reverie. "I mean, we can't go on skirting around it forever."

Nathan sighed. "I'm glad you feel this way. Haley, what I wanted to tell you, was that I like you, a lot. I think you're pretty and smart and funny. I know that I am just repeating what I said before, at your house, but I'm not good with words. What I really want say is that I want you to be my girlfriend. And I know that you're with Lucas, so if you say that you want to be with him, I'll get lost. But I know that, deep down, you don't…"

"Nathan," Haley interrupted. "You misunderstood. When I said that I knew what this was about, I meant the fight you had with Lucas. I wanted to talk to you about it. I didn't mean… this."

"Oh," Nathan said, feeling like he was just kicked in the stomach. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to…"

"No, Nate," Haley didn't let him finish. "What you just said to me, it was so sweet. No one ever said things like that to me before. And I like you too. But..."

"There had to be a 'but'," Nathan sighed.

"But breaking away from Lucas wouldn't be that easy. Who I am is centered around him. I've told you that before."

"It doesn't have to be that way, though. You can recreate yourself."

"No. I can't. I'm sorry, Nate," Haley said slowly. "I think I should go."

"Fine! Go!" Nathan cried, getting angry. "Just don't come running back to me when he dumps you a month from now!"

"Nathan, don't be like this…"

"Like what? I'm just saying that you're preventing yourself from being happy for no reason!" 

"Nathan, you don't understand!" 

"Of course I don't understand! How could I understand this?" Nathan cried, his voice full of bitter sarcasm. "I like you and you like me, but we can't be together because of some idiot that's making you miserable! It's so complicated!"

"You're right, Nathan, you're totally right!" Haley burst. "You wanted to figure it all out and you did. I'm stuck in a miserable relationship and I can't do anything about it! Yes, maybe it's my own fault for getting into this. And it might be my own fault for not wanting to break away from both my boyfriend and my whole group of friends… However, I don't think this is any of your business. It's certainly not up to you to judge."

"Haley, wait," Nathan said as what she had just said began sinking in. "I didn't mean to snap…"

"Nathan, I think I should go," Haley said for the second time in the last ten minutes.

"Don't…" Nathan made a weak attempt at getting Haley to stay, but she had already gotten up. With a final look in Nathan's direction, she turned around and walked out of the library, while Nathan was left to stare at the back of the table and think about what an idiot he had been.


End file.
